This invention relates to a reclining seat for a vehicle such as an automobile.
A manual type reclining seat comprises a buttock-supporting, seat and a backrest reclinably joined to the rear end of the seat. At the joint portion, there are provided a spiral spring for biasing the backrest to its upright position and a locking mechanism for locking the backrest at an adjusted position. A typical locking mechanism is a ratchet mechanism comprising a sector gear mounted on the backrest and a ratchet provided at an end of a control lever and engageable with teeth of the sector gear.
Since the backrest is locked in position by engaging the ratchet with teeth of the gear, its position is adjustable only stepwise, so that it is difficult to recline the backrest precisely to an ideal position at which the user is the least fatigued.
Also, the ratchet often meshes incompletely with a gear tooth. In such a case, the ratchet collides repeatedly against the gear, producing uncomfortable noise.
An object of this invention is to provide a reclining seat having a backrest which can be inclined to any desired position in a stepless manner without producing any awkward noise.